


Polaris

by knightswhosay



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Alternate Universe - Space Opera, Gen, Multi, ish
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-22
Updated: 2015-06-30
Packaged: 2018-04-05 15:46:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4185612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/knightswhosay/pseuds/knightswhosay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the war ended two years ago, Momoi bought a trading vessel and has since transported goods across the galaxy along with Aomine. But Aomine soon realizes there’s more to this cargo transfer than meets the eye.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't a Star Wars AU b/c if it was I'd go the whole nine yards with the Star Wars Universe. But the world is closer to Star Wars than any other well-known scifi world, so you will see similarities. Additionally, I meant for this story to have a slower start, but that's not what the story wanted, so the story pretty much starts full speed ahead.

Satsuki stretched as she walked down her ship's gangplank onto the floor of the large docking bay. While most of the other vessels here were, like hers, transport vessels, there were a few small military starfighters, probably from the station's neighboring star systems, and there was even a small cruise liner, for those among polite society who enjoyed a sense of adventure, of danger, on their jaunt across the galaxy. No doubt the station's own starfighters were in a different hangar.

A man in an obnoxiously orange uniform came walking up to her, clipboard in hand. “Captain Momoi?”

“That's me. What can I do for you?” she asked, although she already knew what he wanted.

“We need your signature on paper. Policy. I'm sure you understand.” She did—she had traveled near Wild Space enough to know most of the extra precautions were needed—but she would guess that some traders who spent most of their time in the safer area of the galaxy would not.

“Of course.” She took the clipboard from him and, after making sure the document was the same as the one she'd already given her virtual signature to, signed it.

He took it back. “Welcome to _Lingering Oasis_.” He trotted off.

Satsuki took one more look across the docking bay before looking back at the gangplank. She pursed her lips together. Her only crewmember had not yet emerged from the ship, which she didn't really find surprising despite how much he'd been moaning about stretching his legs and getting some fresh air the past several days.

 

She found Daiki asleep in his bunk. This was not an unusual event, but instead of how he normally slept—spread eagled across the bed and looking much too big for it—he was curled into a ball and clutching a pillow to his stomach. He wasn't crying or muttering though, so she knew it wasn't a terrible nightmare. Only a bad one.

She sat down by his head and stroked his hair. “Daiki,” she said, gently but loudly, “Daiki, you're okay. It's time to wake up. It's okay. We're finally there.”  She patted at his shoulder, gently at first, then a little firmer. His body relaxed and he let go of the pillow. It slid of the slid of the bunk. He rolled over onto his back and blinked up at her. 

“Satsuki.”

She smiled down at him. “We've docked, Daiki. No thanks to your awesome piloting skills.”

He was too sleep fogged to make a face at her so he opted for sitting up, immediately bumping his head on the bunk above.

“Fuck!” He gingerly touched the top of his forehead then glowered at Satsuki who'd started laughing. “It's about fucking time. You don't know how many times I've done that this trip.”

“I've heard you complain about it enough times. Come one, let's go.”

 

_Lingering Oasis_ was like most of the space stations near Wild Space .  Which meant the clientele was composed of the same three groups. One group was that of space-hardened traders, like her. They were people she'd didn't necessarily trust, but they knew how to handle themselves and would likely not cause trouble. The second group was made up of pirates and smugglers who were dangerous but usually manageable. The third group was made up of locals who came to the spacestation to get their jollies off from being in such high danger zone. They were Satsuki's least favorite group because they could cause as much trouble as pirates with an extra dose of unpredictability and much less manageable since they didn't seem to comprehend warning signals.

Satsuki suited up in black flight jacket and pants and took both her blaster and Daiki as accessories as she secured the ship and walked out of the docking bay.

“This is our drop off point, yeah?” he asked..

“Assuming we find our client.”

“And then we'll be on our way home?”

She paused and her shoulders tensed. “Since that's what Akashi wants.” Her voice was clipped.

Daiki chose not to say anything else until they entered the spacestation's main amenity: a casino slash strip club slash probably a brothel if you knew the right person to ask. When they entered the large room, he dropped behind Satsuki, keeping close. She walked resolutely past the pole dancers, but he couldn't resist looking, though he immediately regretted it. Those women were not human and therefore quite probably not there of their own free-will.

Satsuki slid onto a barstool and ordered porter, was informed the bar didn't have any, and subsequently settled for a lager. She seemed to like it so he ordered the same thing. Once the bar tender had gone another to another customer he asked, “You okay?”

“I'm fine. I'm just not looking forward to going home.”

“Did Akashi—”

“Nothing new,” she said, “I just enjoyed having such a long trip this time.” She finished her beer and in moments the bartender gave another. She turned around at her stool to face the crowd. “But it doesn't matter. Now it's time to find our client.”

Daiki turned in his seat as well, although it was always her who could pick people out of the crowd. He was just the pilot. The really good pilot.

She stood. “I see him.” She laid her glass on the bar and he followed suit. “Come on, Daiki.” He nodded the bartender as they left—their drinks would be added their total bill to be paid when they left the spacestation—and hurried after Satsuki.

If she hadn't been upset before, she was now, although upset was now what he would call “pissed as fuck” and when he saw where they were going, he knew why.

A few meters before they reached their destination, she forced herself to relax and her face slid into a peaceful, blank expression. He always marveled that she—Satsuki, his next door neighbor growing up, the same girl who shrieked at frogs—could pull off a poker face so well. In fact, there were only two people he knew who could do it better: Akashi and the man seated at the table they were now approaching.

“Senator Imayoshi,” Satsuki said, sliding into a seat opposite the man.

“Captain Momoi and,” his eyes slid up to where Daiki was still standing, “Aomine. Wonderful to see you again. Allow me to introduce you to Taris.”

Daiki looked at the woman at Imayoshi's side and his belly flopped. She was the same species as the strippers, a species he thought he knew the name of somewhere in his head, and just like them, she was humanoid with very reddish skin and long bushy white hair that reminded him of a lion's mane. And, also just like them, she was wearing very little clothing. He glared at Imayoshi who didn't seem to notice. “Satsuki,” he asked.

She pulled out the chair next to her. “Sit down.”

“But—”

“Sit down.”

He sat.

Satsuki looked across at Imayoshi. Her poker face was still in place but Daiki was pretty sure she was glaring at Imayoshi. Good. “I wasn't aware you had a new alias,” she said.

He shrugged. “It was necessary.”

“I take it you came on that cruise liner. Did Taris come with you too?”

“No, we met here, at the behest of some trader. Unfortunately, the trader introduced the rest of Taris's friends to the spacestation's owner.”

“I see. But I told you I couldn't pick up another shipment. I'm going straight to the capital after this. I have to.”

Daiki started fidgeting. Satsuki ignored him.

“But, surely, if you made a stop that was on the way.”

Satsuki shook her head. “Our boss wouldn't like that.”

“What if I happened to have a very valuable artifact that I sold to you at under market price? And happened to hook you up with a buyer willing to buy over market price? How would your boss feel about that?”

Satsuki started chewing her lip. It was one of her habits that sometimes slipped through her mask. Finally she said, “Tell me about the drop off details. Then we might have a deal.”

Imayoshi smiled, his mouth razor thin. “Taris has a cousin on Rel IV. He is, among other things, an antiquities collector. Just drop the shipment off with him when you pass by.”

She nodded.

“One more thing though. I'm afraid I have become terribly attached to Taris. I would appreciate it if you brought her to the capital for me.”

That was the last straw for Daiki. He couldn't follow all the ins and outs of the conversation, but he knew that they were talking about transporting people, which was bad, no matter how the law chose to see it. “Satsuki,” he hissed, “you're not serious about doing this, are you?”

There was silence. Around the table, the casino continued as it always did—noisily—but no one at their table spoke.

Imayoshi finally broke the silence. “He doesn't know?”

“No.”

Imayoshi's expression flickered for a second and Daiki recognized the emotion—worry. “Then why did you bring him?

“Stop talking like I'm not here,” Daiki growled.

Satsuki ignored him. Again. “One, because I didn't know this was you. Two, because I trust more than anyone else. Far more than you.”

Imayoshi smiled again and seemed to relax. “That I can believe, Captain.”

Satsuki nodded to him and turned to Daiki. “Daiki, listen. It's not what you think.” He opened his mouth to interrupt but then she said, “Would you really believe that of me? Of me?” He shook his head. “Good. Now listen. I need you to go back to the ship and ready the cargo for transfer. You still want that stuff?” she directed her question at Imayoshi. He nodded. She turned back to Daiki. “And then, when we're back in the ship, I'll explain it you. Okay?”

He looked at her, at Imayoshi, and then at Taris. He'd been avoiding looking at the woman and now that he did . . . she looked like she was almost begging him to listen to Satsuki. He felt nauseous.

“Okay.” He stood and pasted on a grin. He knew those at the table would know it was fake, but they were not the ones he was trying to fool. He announced in the most pompous voice he could, “Leaving so soon? I haven't drunk nearly as much booze as I planned and haven't even gotten to talk to one of those pretty girls.”

Laughs erupted from the tables nearby and followed Daiki as he lumbered his way out of the casino, almost looking like he did when he had too much to drink.

“Why haven't you told him?” Imayoshi asked.

Satsuki debated answering, before deciding that the answer was pretty obvious. “I wanted to protect him. He's not going to fool any interrogator with that acting.”

 

 


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter includes the first flashback I have written in many a year (though perhaps it's not melodramatic or a scene that took place long enough ago to count?). Also, the file name for this work on my computer is scfi nanananananana.

Teppei wiped his forehead with the back of his forearm. It came away streaked with sweat and oil. He reached to the side to grab a wrench, then went back to working on the starfighter. Minutes later, the door to the workshop tinkled open and footsteps he recognized as Riko's walked over to the side. He crawled out from under the starfighter to smile at her.

“Hey.”

She looked seriously at him and he laughed a little to himself. She wore the same uniform shirt as he did—a blue polo shirt with their shop's name on it—but while his was covered in grease, hers was supposed to be clean as she'd been managing the desk today, except that there were clearly several grease stains on it. “I'm closing up the shop.”

“Okay.”

“Think you'll be done with that soon?” she indicated the starfighter. “The owner wants it back next week.”

He frowned slightly. “He did ask for a lot of modifications, but I think it should be ready by then.”

“Good. Wanna go get something to eat at Keelef's Dive?”

“Keelef's? I thought you didn't like that place?”

She shrugged. “I don't, much. But it's the only place you can go looking like that.” She nodded at his dirt shirt and canvas trousers. “I've been there enough that I've found dishes I like.”

He crawled the rest of the way from under the starfighter. “Then I'll get ready to go.”

 

They walked quietly along the side of the road, occasionally passed by landspeeders. It was the dry season on their side of the planet which meant that the savannah was starting to look more like desert, and Teppei knew that by the time they entered Keelef's, his face would have acquired a layer of dust in addition to the grease already on it.

Riko was looking up into the sky. He followed her gaze and saw a starship crossing the sky. It was too far away to tell what type. “Probably going to Yihn,” he said. Yihn was the capital of their planet, Getaieon.

“Yeah.” They continued to walk in silence. Other locals, mostly dressed in light cotton to escape the heat and sun, passed by. Since it was evening, they were chatting amicably amongst themselves, their workday over. As they neared Keelef's, Riko asked, “Do you ever miss the war?”

Teppei wasn't surprised to hear the question, though that didn't make answering it any easier. He had been a pilot in the galactic war that had ended three years ago—well, a lot of people had—and he had a prosthetic leg to show for it. Riko hadn't actually flown a starfighter herself but had been stationed on a battle cruiser as a strategist. “I don't miss being scared and I don't miss having to fight,” he said, finally, “but we did have a type of camaraderie there with everyone that I do miss.”

“And it's not like exactly look them up like old friends, is it? Considering half of them are dead.”

“No, but at least we can be grateful that the Empire decided it was content just winning the war and didn't feel it necessary to arrest or execute everyone who fought to protect their home.”

“Man, I'm so grateful that I could walk up to the Emperor himself and—”

Before Riko could finish what she was saying, they walked into Keelef's Dive and were assaulted with loud music and smoke. She coughed and he good-naturedly clapped her on the back. “You okay?” She glared at him, then made her way up to the bar to order.

“Aida! Kiyoshi!” Keelef greeted them as they stepped up. Keelef was Ciccianese, a bipedal species with insectoid features, including four arms and antennae. Riko privately thought that four arms must make cooking a lot easier. “What can I get for you?”

“I'd like the Qwilathink,” she said, trying to chirp the name correctly but ultimately failing, “and water. It's too dry for anything else.”

“Alright.” Riko passed Keelef her card and they rang it up, then returned Riko's card. “What about you Kiyoshi?”

“Water as well. And whatever is today's special.”

Keelef smiled as Teppei paid. Riko sighed. She'd given up hope on understanding why Teppei was willing to try all of the dive's specials—Ciccianese cuisine mostly consisted of insects, frequently not 100 % insects—even if it obviously made Keelef happy to see a human eat so much of their cuisine.

They settled into a corner of the restaurant furthest away from the speakers and started eating their meal. Teppei's did jump a few times as he felt some of his food crawling around in his mouth, but he focused on looking around the room, looking at that evening's customers.

Keelef's dive catered mostly to nonhumans. Predictably, there were many Ciccianese, but there were also Mivinins—a bipedal canid-like species—Thethens—who looked like humans except that they all had tails at least two-meters long—and he even saw a female Aethian, rarely seen here since female Aethian were one of the most heavily used species in human trafficking and Getaieon had abolished slavery thousands of years ago and was good at enforcing their laws.

Riko's transceiver beeped and she answered it. Teppei listened to her side of the conversation. “Hello . . . Yes . . . But you said . . . Really? Now? . . . I'm not sure we can do that . . . I mean we'll try . . . We'll meet you there.” She hung up and looked at him, her brows knit together.

“What's wrong?”

“Lieutenant Himuro needs his starfighter back and he needs it now. We're going to go meet him back at the shop.”

 

Satsuki stood in front of her new cargo and hoped her body language didn't betray how nervous she was. She glanced over at Taris, near the back of the cargohold, a squarish room about nine meters across. Taris nodded at her, presumably trying to reassure her. Satsuki looked back at the rest of the Aethians.

“Hey,” she said, sounding way too casual to herself but believing anything else would have sounded forced, “I don't know how much Taris has told you, but I'll be your Captain for this part of your trip. We're going to Rel IV where you have some sort of connection flight, but I don't your ultimate destination. Besides freedom. While you're on board I ask that you call me Captain or Breeze, and for security reasons you will need to stay in here and connected lavatory. If you need anything ask Taris or contact me by my transceiver. If there's an emergency and Taris isn't available, you should know there's a trap door under where I'm standing now that you can hide in and that ventilation shaft,” she pointed to a grate near where Taris was, “actually is crawlspace that leads to escape pods.”

She took a breather and someone in the crowd raised there hand. She looked at the woman and guessed she was probably the oldest one here. The woman asked, her expression hard, “I assume you're prepared for pursuit?”

Satsuki nodded. “They probably won't catch up for a few more hours, but we're expecting some type of pursuit. If they sent out a battle-cruiser, we might be in trouble, but we're just expecting a few starfighters. That much we can handle.” A few of Aethians murmured doubt, but the woman asked her seemed to accept that answer. “If there's not anything else, I'm going to go to the cockpit.”

 

The door to the cockpit slid open and she slipped into the copilot's chair next to Daiki. “Hey,” she said. He grunted but didn't look at her. He was still mad. She closed her eyes and remembered their earlier confrontation.

_She had just entered the ship when he ambushed her and yelled “What the hell was all that about? What the fuck is going on?”_

_It was weird, hearing him yell like that. He might complain a lot and be passive aggressive as shit, but he didn't yell like that too much. Her reaction was to yell back. “What the hell was that? You could have been someone attacking me!”_

_He exhaled and slowly relaxed his posture, but he was still staring at her. “_ _You said you would tell me.”_

_She swallowed. “I did. It's . . . It's hard to start. Let's see. I'm part of Freedom's Winds.”_

_“Freedom's Winds . . . I know that name.”_

_She laughed. “You should. They're the most active abolitionist group. The Empire's been trying to crack down on them.”_

_“_ _The Empire?” He groaned. “Satsuki, why'd you have to get involved in this?”_

_“Someone has to.”_

_He sighed. “So . . . what we're doing now? What's Imayoshi got to do with this?”_

_“You might say he's our corporate sponsor. Our most visible one, anyway.” She grinned. “He's good at protective coloration, isn't he? As for what we're doing . . . that should pretty obvious Daiki. We're stealing the spacestation_ _'s slaves and we're going to help them escape from slavery.”_

_“_ _And you've done this before?”_

_She nodded. “Yes . . . but never this many at a time. Usually I only take one or two at a time. It's safer that way. Actually,” she breathed in before continuing, “you've taken a few as well.”_

_He stared at her. “What.”_

_“Yeah . . . Do you remember that Iwer I said paid for passage one time?”_

_“Iwer?”_

_“The flower people, the ones who reproduce asexually.”_

_He stared at her._

_“Daiki?”_

_“Why the fuck didn't you tell me?_

_“_ _I . . .” Daiki was not going to like her answer, “It was safer for you that way. I was afraid that if Akashi found out about me_ _that he would think you would probably be helping me. If I kept you in the dark, at the most he'd get angry at you for being stupid, or too trusting, or something. You wouldn't be killed.”_

_“You mean like you would be if he found out. Like I could if I don't turn you in.”_

_She nodded._

_“Did you consider that maybe I wanted to help, enough to risk my life?” His voice was cold._

_“Daiki—”_

_“We need to talk about tonight. You have a plan for actually stealing these women?”_

_“. . . Yeah.”_

She opened her eyes and turned to look at Daiki. He was looking at her and when she looked at him, he quickly turned away. When he spoke, his voice was low. “If you want to take a nap, now would be the time.” 

“ How long do we have?”

“If they left right now . . . about an hour.”

“Taris said their shift starts at 0600 and that they're supposed to be woken up at 0400. That's an hour from now.”

“If they don't leave for another hour,  they'll take an additional three hours to catch up.”

Satsuki looked at the controls in front of her. She could tell she was tired; her shoulders were tight with stress and her eyes were heavy. She sneaked a glance at Daiki and saw that he had dark rings under his eyes. They'd had longer nights than this, but not any this stressful since the war. “ If we have so much time, why don't you go get some sleep? I may not be the ace of the 48 th squadron but I know how to fly my ship. You need to get some sleep too and I can wake you before they catch up.”

“No.”

“Daiki—”

“No.” He rolled his head toward her. “Stop nagging.” His expression looked annoyed, as if he were actually affronted by her words, but it felt off. Satsuki stood.

“Okay. But wake me up before they catch up. And if you want a nap, wake me up and we'll switch.”

He grunted.

“Daiki?”

“Sure, whatever.”

Satsuki glanced back at Daiki sitting over the ship's controls one last time before leaving the cockpit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll have you know I actually worked out some of the math on the ship's speeds. So the math in this fic will be right even if the science is nowhere near accurate. I don't like having really long notes, so feel free to ask me questions, in comments here or on my tumblr.

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I'm writing this story by the seat of my pants. I have little idea of where it's going and if it'll keep on going (though so far studies suggest yes). This includes ships. If ships concern you so much, I can probably tell you what ships there won't be, if you go to my tumblr (butnolivingmanami.tumblr.com) as well as answer other questions related this au. Additionally, since this story isn't tagged with a couple, I'm expecting it not to get as much traffic, so if you like it, please share it.


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